An information appliance (IA) is an appliance that is designed to easily perform a specific electronic function such as playing music,

photography Photography is the visual arts, art, application, and practice of creating images by recording light, either electronically by means of an image sensor, or chemically by means of a light-sensitive material such as photographic film. It is empl ...

, or editing text. Typical examples are

smartphone A smartphone is a mobile phone with advanced computing capabilities. It typically has a touchscreen interface, allowing users to access a wide range of applications and services, such as web browsing, email, and social media, as well as multi ...

s and

personal digital assistant A personal digital assistant (PDA) is a multi-purpose mobile device which functions as a personal information manager. Following a boom in the 1990s and 2000s, PDAs were mostly displaced by the widespread adoption of more highly capable smar ...

s (PDAs). Information appliances partially overlap in definition with, or are sometimes referred to as, smart devices,

embedded system An embedded system is a specialized computer system—a combination of a computer processor, computer memory, and input/output peripheral devices—that has a dedicated function within a larger mechanical or electronic system. It is e ...

mobile device A mobile device or handheld device is a computer small enough to hold and operate in hand. Mobile devices are typically battery-powered and possess a flat-panel display and one or more built-in input devices, such as a touchscreen or keypad. ...

s or wireless devices.

Appliance vs computer

The term ''information appliance'' was coined by Jef Raskin around 1979. As later explained by Donald Norman in his influential ''The Invisible Computer'', the main characteristics of IA, as opposed to any normal

computer A computer is a machine that can be Computer programming, programmed to automatically Execution (computing), carry out sequences of arithmetic or logical operations (''computation''). Modern digital electronic computers can perform generic set ...

, were: * designed and pre-configured for a single application (like a toaster appliance, which is designed only to make toast), * so easy to use for untrained people, that it effectively becomes unnoticeable, "invisible" to them, * able to automatically share information with any other IAs. This definition of IA was different from today's. Jef Raskin initially tried to include such features in the

Apple Macintosh Mac is a brand of personal computers designed and marketed by Apple Inc., Apple since 1984. The name is short for Macintosh (its official name until 1999), a reference to the McIntosh (apple), McIntosh apple. The current product lineup inclu ...

, which he designed, but eventually the project went a quite different way. For a short while during the mid- and late 1980s, there were a few models of simple electronic

typewriter A typewriter is a Machine, mechanical or electromechanical machine for typing characters. Typically, a typewriter has an array of Button (control), keys, and each one causes a different single character to be produced on paper by striking an i ...

s with screens and some form of memory storage. These dedicated

word processor A word processor (WP) is a device or computer program that provides for input, editing, formatting, and output of text, often with some additional features. Early word processors were stand-alone devices dedicated to the function, but current word ...

machines had some of the attributes of an information appliance, and Raskin designed one of them, the Canon Cat. He described some properties of his definition of information appliance in his book '' The Humane Interface''. Larry Ellison,

Oracle Corporation Oracle Corporation is an American Multinational corporation, multinational computer technology company headquartered in Austin, Texas. Co-founded in 1977 in Santa Clara, California, by Larry Ellison, who remains executive chairman, Oracle was ...

CEO, predicted that information appliances and

network computer In computer networking, a thin client, sometimes called slim client or lean client, is a simple (low-performance) computer that has been optimized for establishing a remote connection with a server-based computing environment. They are som ...

s would supersede personal computers (PCs).

References

External links

Compact HTML for Small Information Appliances — W3C NOTE
(9 February 1998) {{DEFAULTSORT:Information Appliance

Appliance vs computer

See also

References

External links